Everyone’s waiting for something. For the Christian, we eagerly await the second coming of our Savior. During this season of Advent -- the expectant anticipation of our Lord’s second coming in our celebration of His first arrival -- we are once more stopped in our tracks, jolted out of the everyday mundane with “Don’t be afraid! I bring you good news of great joy, which is for all people!”
As we continue our journey through Advent, we are diving into this message from the angel to the shepherds. Why shouldn’t we fear? What is the good news? What makes it so joyful? Did he really mean for all people?
Good News Is a Verb
They walked in off the street looking for help. A mom with her four kids, ranging in age from 4 to 10, stood in the foyer of our church where I introduced myself and asked, “How can I help you?” The weary mother shared with me about her journey from out-of-state to a homeless shelter in our neighborhood. As the mom talked about their need for clothes and her need for a job, she held her youngest girl who fidgeted in her arms. Her other three kids didn’t share the irritability of their little sister nor the fatigue of their mom. They smiled as they interjected questions and thoughts, both related and random, in between their mom’s words. The oldest boy was a curious explorer. He wandered across the threshold of the foyer into the main room of the building. (During the week, our church is converted to a ministry center that offers programs such as afterschool and ESL to our South Bronx neighborhood.) Looking around, the boy exclaimed, “I like it here!” The kids were clothed in the resilience I have come to expect from youth walking a beleaguered journey, but the clothes on their back weren’t going to do them much good when the weather took a turn as I expected it would soon.
I could tell this family needed good news.
On the night of Jesus’s birth, the angel exclaimed to the shepherds, “I bring you good news . . .” (Luke 2:10). Roughly thirty years later, Jesus said he was “anointed to bring good news to the poor” (Luke 4:18). In both these cases, the word in the Greek isn’t a noun, it’s a verb. It’s not just something being said, it’s something being done.
When the apostle John wrote about the miracle the angels announced that first Christmas night, he described it as “the Word became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). The Word didn’t become more words, It became a friend to John. As Eugene Peterson put it in The Message, “The Word … moved into the neighborhood.”
In John 20:21, Jesus gave his followers this command: “As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you.” He sends us to be good news while preaching the Good News to a world that is desperate for good news. All too often, people can’t hear the Good News because they don’t see the Good News through our actions.
On that day, standing in the foyer, the mom and her kids needed good news. Yes, they need the Good News, but first they needed some coats and a gift card for a meal. They needed friends who knew their name. They needed people who wouldn’t just help once but offer to walk with them on their journey. They needed to hear a prayer prayed on their behalf. They needed to be remembered and have people eager to see them again.
They needed “good news” to be a verb.